My biggest concern before watching Hack Your Health: The Secrets of Your Gut was: what if the documentary ends up making me feel miserable? Because of the title, it did seem like an extended version of one of those preachy health commercials, which do nothing but scare you about your own health. But Hack Your Health turned out to be much different and definitely better than that. It surely didn’t make me feel worried. In fact, I would say that the very informative documentary is actually a pleasant watch. Let’s take a closer look.
What Happens in the Documentary?
It was evident from the title that the documentary was going to be about the gut. Staying true to that, Hack Your Health doesn’t waste a minute to get into the point. It begins by telling the audience that the gut is much more than the organ from where the poop comes from—something that most of us already know, I suppose. The person who tells you this is Giulia Enders, author of the book called “Gut.” Giulia appears as one of the main narrators of the documentary, and she does a fantastic job explaining the science of guts in layman’s terms.
Hack Your Health eases us into things with the obvious facts, like that the gut is where our immune system lives, our mental well-being is attached to our gut health, and bacteria are not always bad before getting into the microbiome. From Giulia and other experts, we learn about microbes—the organisms that live inside our guts and form a colony, which is basically the microbiome. What we need is to feed the microbes, and in return, they take care of gut health. And the feeding has to be fiber-rich, in the lines of veggies and fruits, and certainly not things like fast foods. It’s simple and easy to understand; at least Hack Your Health makes it look that way.
But the documentary is not just about this piece of information. Soon we are introduced to four people: pastry chef Maya, doctoral student Daniell, single mom Kimmie, and competitive eater Kobiyashi. Each one of them has different issues: Maya is obsessed with healthy eating and she can’t find a solution; Daniell is suffering from gut pain; Kobi has no sense of appetite; and Kimmie is trying to lose weight but is unable to do so. The rest of the documentary is about examining these four and finding out if their problems are solved, while also learning about new things.
While running a gut health test for all four makes all the sense in the world, the process of doing that might surprise you, although it really shouldn’t. How else can the gut be explored without your stool sample? And it goes exactly like that: the four subjects are tasted, and the issues with their guts are found out. Maya is still okay, despite her struggle to find the right food. Kobi’s gut health is not ruined despite his eating too many hot dogs, and his not feeling hungry is more psychological than a gut issue. Kimmie needs a better diet for herself in order to achieve her goal. But Daniell is the most interesting case here, as she volunteers to go for a FMT.
FMT, or fecal microbiota transplantation, is the highlight of Hack Your Health…, and this is where you’re caught off guard. I’m sure not many of you ever imagined that this kind of treatment was actually a real thing. Although Hack Your Health shows taking one’s feces and simply putting it inside another person with weaker gut health in order to make things better for the patient, it does make sense. There’s still a risk of bad bacteria getting transferred during the process, but Daniell gets cured thanks to her healthier brother. Maya also finds the perfect smoothie, made with tons of fruits and veggies. Kimmie manages to get her kids on board with healthier eating, and we see all of them enjoying a corn dinner together. And Kobi balances out his hotdog by upgrading to a healthier version of it. Most essentially, Hack Your Health reassures us that we’re not doing too badly, and even if we are, some little changes can help us get back on track.
Is It Worth A Watch?
If only I had Netflix during my school days, then I probably would have learned a lot more about gut health, thanks to documentaries like Hack Your Health. The Anjali Nayar directed documentary doesn’t stop at informing you about the nitty-gritties of gut; it makes sure that it does it in a way that engages the audience. It is a health documentary, alright, but it actually looks very colorful and vibrant. I’m sure that has a lot to do with the glossy production values of Netflix. But just like food needs to look edible for you to actually feel like eating it, a health documentary has to look appealing enough for you to actually tune into it. Hack Your Health uses eye-popping animations in order to explain the basics of gut health, from what happens when food gets inside to what comes out of your body. In a way, it is quite fun to watch, and showing this documentary to school kids might help them learn better.
Another high point of Hack Your Health is it not being condescending, unlike some of your physicians. You walk into the chamber with a bloated stomach, and your doctor is scolding you for eating red meat, which is certainly not something that helps you. Not to mention the obsession with cutting down on food in order to lose weight some people have! Don’t get me wrong here; I am not blaming anyone here, but just trying to point out the issues the documentary points out and why it scores so much. Despite being a health documentary, Hack Your Health doesn’t advise you to change your eating habits drastically or even to cut down on fast food. Instead of that, all it does is present the facts about your gut to you in such a manner that you feel the urge to make sure that you are okay. It’s admirable how the documentary focuses on the relationship between gut and mental health, a common fact that many of us ignore.
One must not expect the thrill and chills of a standard Netflix documentary of a certain genre in Hack Your Health: The Secrets of Your Gut. It is not supposed to be entertaining; it is a program that you should enjoy with a tub of popcorn and coke. Instead, this is something you might want to watch during your work breaks and commutes if you want to learn something about your gut and live a little better.
